The Klamath dams by the numbers

Removing the four salmon-blocking dams on
the Klamath may prove even cheaper than regulators first thought.
The California Energy Commission just re-ran the numbers, comparing
the costs of removing the dams versus retrofitting them for fish
passage. The results, released March 24, say it would cost
PacifiCorp $114 million less to breach the dams than to remodel
them.

PacifiCorp, however, disagrees. Company spokesman
Dave Kvamme says the commission has failed to consider the cost of
dealing with the sediments released by dam removal. “The best
outcome for the environment and the Klamath river would be to
re-license the Klamath hydro project and make investments in fish
ladders,” says Kvamme. After the California Energy Commission
released a report in December estimating that removal would be $101
million cheaper than retrofitting, PacifiCorp contracted its own
cost analysis. The company concluded that it would save $46 million
by remodeling the dams.

For this third report, the
commission used numbers provided in PacifiCorp’s analysis and
corrected errors in the first report, says Susanne Garfield, an
Energy Commission spokeswoman. She says the report didn’t
assess costs for sediments because another study indicated that
sediment deposits and their toxicity wouldn’t affect the
price.

The Klamath River is one of the most important
spawning passages for imperiled chinook and coho salmon and
steelhead trout, and breaching its dams has been debated for years.
Even as the California Energy Commission and PacifiCorp duke it out
-- and their respective consulting firms do good business -- the
dams are still killing fish.

They’re also killing
the fishing industry: Western senators recently requested $60.4
million in disaster assistance for salmon fisherman in the 2007
Emergency Supplemental spending bill. (See previous HCN reporting
on salmon
fishing closures and fish
kills along the Klamath.)

PacifiCorp’s
50-year license for the dams expired last year; the company is
operating under annual extensions until the Federal Energy
Regulatory Commission plows through the paperwork and reaches a
decision. That decision could be further complicated by a lawsuit
just filed by nonprofit Klamath Riverkeeper against PacifiCorp,
asserting that pollutants from the hatchery at Iron Gate Dam
violate the Clean Water Act.

Click here
to see American Rivers' simulation of the Klamath before
and after dam removal.